...Or Not A New Fridge!

While I enjoy today's morning coffee, I will tell you of yesterday's un-adventure. 

Expecting a new fridge to be delivered, the kids and I spent an hour or so getting ready. 

I put the car out on the road and shoveled the driveway. The kids cleared off the fridge of magnets and other bits and bobs such an appliance seems to accumulate. They emptied the freezer portion and crammed those contents into my little deep freeze. It was a toss up between the rainbow sorbet and the spring rolls, though. One of them wasn't going to fit. We had spring rolls for breakfast. 

We packed up the fridge contents into the grocery bins and the picnic cooler and stashed those in the backyard. It was -16C (3F for my American friends) but I figured the produce would be ok for an hour or so. 

The kids suddenly remembered their school work and disappeared as I started cleaning the fridge. The outside, the inside, that gross spot under the fridge. It was a lovely clean fridge. 

It was a lovely clean, OLD fridge that had remained in its spot a few years ago when the new flooring and baseboards had been installed. The Boy Child was recruited and we wrestled that fridge out of the kitchen without damaging the baseboards. It was a close call. 

We watched The Rick Mercer Report. It counts as school work. 

We had lunch.

Some of us ate half a jar of olives for lunch because the olive juice was found to be a little slushy when I was searching through the bins in the backyard for the ketchup. 

I called the building manager and left a message. We went on with our afternoon. The kids headed downtown - on foot because what if the delivery truck came while I was driving them? Their idea. Considerate teens. 

About 3pm, I put the fridge back in the kitchen. The baseboards survived but I am having a hard time caring about that. I rescued my produce and bins from the backyard. Hindsight tells me the produce should have gone into the cooler with the milk and cream. I repacked the fridge. 

The fresh, new, polite, professional and excited-because-he's-going-to-fix-ALL-the-things Building Manager can't explain why the fridge wasn't delivered. So I explained to the kids that the fridge was going to stay packed up until I had another fridge in my living room waiting to be swapped out. 

4 more weeks until I get my own house where I can argue with my own self about fridges. 

♥Mrs. A. 

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A New Fridge...

Yesterday the Boy Child was found in his natural habitat. Leftovers for breakfast. It seems he can balance a canned drink on nothing but good looks and gravity. 

I'm enjoying a quiet coffee this morning. Mr. A is away from home today for work. The teenagers will stay in bed for as long as I let them. (Cue clunky sounds of feet and waking up from upstairs as soon as the words were typed...)

Today will be interesting. It seems that a new fridge will arrive around 10am. There's a long convoluted story surrounding the circumstances that can be summed up shortly: Give notice that you're moving out; receive new fridge. 

After 15 years at our townhouse, Mr. A and I have bought a home. It seems a little surreal, this waiting period between house purchase and actual house occupation, but I know that it will get very real, very quickly. The timing had to be very precise in order for us to give proper notice here at our rental. Careful planning and a quick closing date allowed us to give our notice at the end of February as we had hoped. 

To cover all our bases, we ended up contacting the elusive building owner directly to let him know we were leaving. As he is one of the most uncommunicative people on the planet, we were shocked speechless that he quickly acknowledged our notice. We were a little surprised that he asked us why we were leaving. In the end, there was an actual communication trail of emails that went on and on until I stopped responding to him. 

To answer his initial question, I immediately wrote a very direct, very descriptive email which outlined our ongoing problems with the property maintenance, the poor management by the onsite (and ever changing) building managers and  the awful new neighbours and their illegal activities which are allowed to continue. The owner replied that a new fridge was on its way and was there any way we would consider staying on as tenants?

We were treated to an account of Blame Game from this owner-guy. As we expected - and have experienced over the years - he blamed the most recent building managers for the lack of...well, everything. Those building managers, on their way out, treated us to a rendition of the Blame Game themselves, assuring us that it was a lack of willingness the part of the owner to take care of our issues. 

So today we get a new fridge. I'm sure the new tenants, whoever the poor saps are, will enjoy the working lightbulb, the matching crisper drawer that fits the fridge it's in, the tight door seals, the energy savings and the quiet operation of a new fridge. 

Today is also the day the new building managers, poor saps, will come to 'inspect' our townhouse. It seems the owner has told them this is routine. Once a tenant gives notice, a pre-move-out inspection is done so as to be able to plan for the work that will need to be done between tenants. Interesting, since there is a record of multiple maintenance requests just waiting to be filled for our unit. 

It seems odd, all this attention. Especially since we had been attempting to contact someone for the entire month of February. If giving our notice to leave is all it took for us to be listened to, I would have done it years ago!!

♥Mrs. A. 

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A Few Bloggish Words...

I thought I would take a moment to say a couple of bloggish words while I had my coffee this morning. 

I'm not feeling particularly eloquent. But I have been feeling like I'm missing blogging. Obviously, looking at the archives, I've been missing blogging for years. 

I think I may have figured out what happened. I think I felt there was too much to keep up with. At first I was just blogging. Then there was the rush in blog land to quick! get followers! And feeds and tags. Be sure to add in pretty photography! Tutorials!! Don't forget giveaways...and sponsors. Guest bloggers! Custom designed layouts! 

I think during all of that I got distracted and lost my blogging mojo. 

Then there came 'the Facebook' and 'the Twitter', as I say to the kids, annoying them greatly. Bloggers were falling off the blog lists and just not writing anymore. 

Recently, I came across an article or a blog post or headline or smoke signal while poking around the Internet. I must have skimmed it, letting the jist of the content sink in at a later time, forgetting exactly where I saw it. There's not enough coffee left in my cup to find it right now. 

The bare bones of the article was something about things getting too complicated and too fast and those who felt like they needed to change with the times were being left behind. Ok, maybe the last part was me. But still, there's something there that has made me think about blogging.

I'd lost what I like about blogging. So what if blogging has changed? So what that many are making a business out of it. So what if I'm not inspired to create a blog that is Google+ connected with a Twitter feed in the sidebar having linked-to-a-thousand-others Wordless Wednesday articles - hey look at my Pinterest! - with a giveaway the Friday after the Guest Blogger entertained you while I was away? I never go away. 

I'm still drawn to read the 'boring' writing of bloggers who blog without the flashiness. A picture here and there. A page I can scroll through. Perhaps a sidebar with an archive. Bloggers who blog about aspects of life and tell you about what's going in their experience. 

It's harder and harder to find what I'm looking for in the blogosphere. Is there even a blog-universe anymore? Is it a sign I'm getting older when I'm satisfied with the status quo? I'm not unwilling to acknowledge/use/learn the new technologies, but is it ok if I don't want to? 

♥Mrs. A. 

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